EVENTS

Disposing of the women

According to an Iraqi lawmaker of Yezidi origin Vian Dakhil, who addressed the Iraqi parliament last week, with tears in her eyes, “IS militants have abducted five hundred Yezidis women”. Later the Iraqi Human Rights Ministry indicated that families of the captives had contacted them to report the abduction of their womenfolk.

Erbil-based media network Rudaw was one of the few local media channels that quoted eyewitnesses who survived the attack saying “hundreds of women were kidnapped and transferred by IS jihadists to an unknown place in Mosul”.

The whereabouts of the kidnapped women became known when the head of the Women’s Rights Commission at the Kurdistan Region’s Parliament, Evar Ibrahim, confirmed on Tuesday 6 August that “the number of kidnapped Yezidi women had reached five hundreds, and they were transferred to a sports hall opposite to the Nineveh Palace Hotel in Western Mosul”. She added that the women were kept in “distressing conditions”. Later, when Qaraqosh was invaded by jihadists, local media channels reported that Christian women had also been taken captive.

What has happened to those women? According to media reports, some were buried alive. On 6 August, a spokesman for the Iraqi Red Cross, Muhammad al-Khuza’ee, stated that the Yezidi and Christian women “were taken as spoils of war and exposed at a market for sale”. The women were reportedly subjected to sexual assault, gang rape and sexual slavery.

When I see these things, all I can feel is more hate. I wish I could turn that into something more constructive for this situation, but honestly using the strong feelings to get attention and demand priority changes globally is the best I can do.

Why people can’t see the spectrum of similarities between how women are treated all over, and the need to attack their own local version is a thing I want to understand only to more effectively work on it.

More whatabouttery about ISIS when the real carnage and genocide is in Gaza. Get a grip Ophelia! Our moral outrage may bend the Zionofascists to our will but those dear boys in Iraq with the black standard of their prophet (quite a few of them from the global ummah) are simply blowback against western perfidy and imperialism. What’s a bit of sex slavery these days?

More whatabouttery about ISIS when the real carnage and genocide is in Gaza. Get a grip Ophelia! Our moral outrage may bend the Zionofascists to our will but those dear boys in Iraq with the black standard of their prophet (quite a few of them from the global ummah) are simply blowback against western perfidy and imperialism. What’s a bit of sex slavery these days?

I haven’t read any prior posts from you, Miraxpath, so it’s difficult to interpret intent without that historical context. But I’m assuming this is snark or sarcasm or some similar form of expression (but I’m not always correct in that interpretation, Poe’s Law and all). I’ll just say that moral outrage re Israel’s wholesale and indiscriminate slaughter of a civilian population doesn’t preclude moral outrage at ISIS; nor does it preclude recognizing the West’s role in *both* Don’t invite me to choose sides in these absurd religious wars because the sides can’t agree on the proper name of their respective invisible sky-beings. I choose neither Israel nor ISIS.

Reality_based_community, miraxpath is mocking people like you and you are only dimly aware that something like that is happening.

The statement “Israel’s wholesale and indiscriminate slaughter of a civilian population” is just baseless smear that exemplifies why strident criticism of Israel is so often deemed anti-Jewish prejudice. If Israel wanted to commit “wholesale slaughter” as you claim, they probably would have killed more than the 0.1% of the Gazan populace after weeks of fighting. Analysis by the BBC and New York Times has also disproved the blood libel of “indiscriminate slaughter”. How ironic the disconnect between your username, and well…reality.

I dislike a lot of Israel policy, most obviously the indefensible settlements, but even speaking of them as somehow equivalent or a parallel to ISIS in nature is just unhinged bigotry on your part.

The statement “Israel’s wholesale and indiscriminate slaughter of a civilian population” is just baseless smear that exemplifies why strident criticism of Israel is so often deemed anti-Jewish prejudice.

Baseless smear? Wow, you really aren’t paying attention at all, or you have blinders of industrial strength. How many schools, hospitals, ambulances, UN sanctuaries, shelters, etc. have to be destroyed before one begins to understand that they are targets? Cause’, with all of the hi-tech weaponry Israel obtains from the US, i can’t really believe they are such “bad shots” in which the poor shooting invariable seems to hit civilian targets.

And your cite doesn’t lead any reasonable reader to conclude that civilians aren’t being targets. Rather, we get “Men of this age [mid 20s] may also be mistaken for fighters because they fit the age profile.”

And “blood libel?” Grow up. There’s plenty of blood, but I question the accusation of libel. Israel has declared war on an entire ethnic population, not an identifiable military force or threat. As Noam Chomsky recently said, (paraphrasing), Israeli policy should in no way be compared to Apartheid. It’s far worse.

ISIS is evil. WHY aren’t we stopping this? we love to go in, guns blazing, for all kinds of shit, but not to save these women? WTF.
The situation with Isis is NOTHING like whats going on in Gaza.

And your understanding of Israel is ignorant as can be. I cannot believe any so called freethinker supports Hamas, over Jews. Hamas, who would wipe US out at any moment, if they could vs our best ally, who we share values with, that affords freedoms unheard of in the Arab world.

JEWS are the ones under siege. THEY are the ones trying not to kill civilians (what other nation calls civilians and tells them to get out bombs are coming, or sends fliers? NONE) But, when Hamas uses those schools, homes, and other civilian places as the launching places for rockets and other operations, what do you think is going to happen? Israel could wipe them all out in about 20 minutes, but they don’t. I am sick of hearing how they should show restraint, yet THEY accept all peace offers, THEY respect cease fires. THEY gave Gaza back entirely, but when attacks intensified, they had to restrict their borders. But they are evil.

To people like you, the only good Jew is a dead Jew. You expect them to lay down and die, and to not fight back. If Hamas would accept ANY of the peace offers (which gave them everything they asked for numerous times) , there would be peace. If Israel lays down arms, they will be slaughtered. true is, you and those like you just think Israel has no right to be there. Well, they are there. Deal with it.

I’m not a Jew, but I am 100% behind their struggle. I guess spending a lot of time in all of these areas would be a little more enlightening then sitting behind a keyboard, safe, on the other side of the world. Talking shit about things you know nothing about.

It impossible to reason with people consumed by their hatred of Israel. When I disprove one outrageous libel, you scurry around and shift your goalposts:

And your cite doesn’t lead any reasonable reader to conclude that civilians aren’t being targets.

Excuse me, but you accused Israel of “wholesale and indiscriminate slaughter” above. You not only fail to defend that serious and sweeping accusation, but have backed all the way up to a much more narrow question of Israel ever targeting civilians at all. Israel has admitted that the only way it can target Hamas and other militants who are entrenched in civilian buildings is to target those buildings. Civilian deaths are inevitable. Hamas and other Islamist groups can always turn in their weapons à la the IRA and the civilian deaths will stop immediately. Hamas and groups like it drive the cycle of fighting by giving Israel a causa belli.

“Cause’, with all of the hi-tech weaponry Israel obtains from the US, i can’t really believe they are such “bad shots” in which the poor shooting invariable seems to hit civilian targets.

Do you have any proof the the U.S. (or any nation) kills fewer civilians with the same (or better) weaponry when engaged in urban combat? Or is that just empty moral posturing rooted in a mindset that holds the lone Jewish state to unique, often utopian standards in defending itself?

Fortunately the actual calculation involves replacing “Hamas” with Palestinians. You are really not going to do much persuasion here if you need to pretend people want to support a terrorist organization because you can’t deal with the fact that Israel is into indiscriminate killing nowadays.

All too many people, like Staceyjw @7, see things in black and white. There are the Good Guys™, wearing white hats and whose every action is noble and pure, and the Bad Guys™, wearing black hats and whose every action is evil villainy. I won’t try to explain to Staceyjw the Palestinian side of the controversy because I don’t want to defend myself against the automatic charge of antisemitism (or in my case Jewish self-hatred) that xe would throw at me. I’ll just say that Israel and Hamas are both wearing dark gray hats.

ISIS/Islamic State do not show the least hint of white in their headgear.

you can’t deal with the fact that Israel is into indiscriminate killing nowadays.

The people here who cannot deal with facts are fanatics like you and Reality-Based_Community who accuse Israel of crimes for which you have no evidence. I already provided evidence from two of the major English language news sources that completely disproves your bigoted libel of “indiscriminate” killing.

First, the discussion is about Yazidi women kidnapped, raped, and murdered.

ISIS, or whatever they call themselves, seem to be doing everything possible to make themselves into super-villains reviled by everyone with even a scrap of decency. I would think that this sort of egregious behavior would make cutting their funding and support easy. We can build monsters, play with monsters, and use the existence of monsters for our own ends but it isn’t politic to become too closely associated with monsters.

We know that Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been funding, help organize, and providing logistical support for ISIS and related groups for some time. Qatar makes its money as a middleman and SA has oil and the Muslim holy sites. If traders stopped using Qatar as middleman and stopped buying SA oil, and/or contested SA custody of the holy sites, I suspect that their support for ISIS might be muted. Make a big enough public relations stink about them backing and having responsibility for the actions of mass murderers of women and embarrassment will force them to back away. This seems like a promising PR tactic.

Of course as soon as you put support for ISIS on the table you eliminate any chance that support will stop entirely. They will support ISIS as some minimal level, likely just enough to keep them functional as pawns on the board, precisely because you want them to go away entirely. Welcome to diplomacy in the middle east.

Why don’t we “do something” about ISIS killing Yezidis?

Unfortunately military options are limited.

Direct affirmative action, like dropping an airborne division between ISIS and the Yazitis isn’t in the cards for political, diplomatic, and strategic reasons. US ground troops, in any significant numbers, doesn’t seem likely. The American people are not up for that sort of thing. If other ground troops were available the US might contribute our expertise and transport capacity. The French have several fine airborne/air mobile units that could deploy very quickly. Other types of units would take days or weeks to deploy.

Ideally there would be very fast deploying blocking units placed between the ISIS fighters and Yazitis so the ISIS forces don’t rush in and finish them off. Some units with more depth and capacity like armored cav to back up that line, hold the flanks, and establish a corridor. Air and artillery support, scout/recon with attached interpreters to find the Yazidis, report where they are and collect them. Helicopter and/or truck transport units to move them. At least one smallish mobile medical unit to handle Yazidi wounded or weakened, a command structure to coordinate, and some reserve to plug holes and deal with contingencies. Figure 6000 troops traveling light.

The logistics are also all wrong. A couple of MAUs flown in off the coast of the Med sounds good but Syria is a war zone, Lebanon is not much better, and coastal Israel, while secure, is too far away. The Persian Gulf is a confined little Iranian lake unsuitable for a naval task force. So overland? Nobody wants to go back to IEDs and Jihadi attacks on US convoys. The alternative, an air bridge, is far too costly. That and, inevitably, it wouldn’t take long before the presence of US troops became more of an issue than ISIS killing Yazidis. Even if we had political will and public mandate the situation is not conducive.

That is the nature of military power. It can do amazing things in the right setting and situation but there are limits.

Unfortunately the media and movies present an image of major western powers as precise and near surgical military machines that can do miraculous things. Anything, anywhere, any time. It’s in the movies, so it has to be true.

In that context mistakes are seen as purposeful acts. When we blew up the Chinese embassy a whole lot of people saw that as a willful act. After seeing scores of videos of missiles fired from a 1000 miles away fling through windows a lot of people assumed we didn’t make mistakes. To hit the wrong building, on the wrong block? That was clearly no minor error. Except it really was. The missile flies to set of coordinates over a virtual map. If you put in the wrong coordinates, say you transpose a couple of numbers, the missile blindly follows orders and goes to those incorrect coordinates. A mistake you don’t learn about until the news is reporting the Chinese embassy exploding. Used to be small errors meant you missed by a small amount. With computerized systems even small errors can mean things going boom many miles from the intended target.

Modern automated gun systems and missiles have very high reliability rates and are, by WW2 standards, amazingly accurate and precise . I’ve seen ratings of >99% chance of < 5m circular error at several thousand meters range for some systems. That means that out of 100 shells fired 99 fall with 5m or the aim point. It also means that 1 out of 100 falls outside that circle. Sometimes, depending on the nature of the failure, it may land a long way away from that circle.

This also means that people are going to assume that that wild shot landed exactly where it was intended to land. Unfortunately our advancement in accuracy and precision has made people assume we have mastered levels of perfection nobody can achieve. No matter how good you get people want more and they either get disappointed or they mistake error for malice.

Related but OT:
The people accusing Israel of targeting civilians don't seem to understand the power of the weapons used. Artillery is designed to decimate armies. In typical military engagements artillery accounts for roughly 60 to 70% of the casualties. A single shell can kill scores. If the Israelis targeted civilians the numbers killed would be much much higher, particularly since the Palestinians haven't chosen to provide entrenchments. The relatively small numbers killed and limited number of incidents is evidence of restraint.

Me too. I just want them all to die. Not even slow. I just want them fucking gone from the earth. I don’t even care how.

*sigh* At least they are airlifting in supplies and giving weapons to the Kurds. That won’t hurt but it doesn’t seem to helping very much either. Australia was considering sending troops. I hope they do. Someone needs to to. I guess the rest of us can just tune into the genocide show next week and see who’s left. And pat ourselves on the back for not doing anything in.fucking.convenient.

The people here who cannot deal with facts are fanatics like you and Reality-Based_Community who accuse Israel of crimes for which you have no evidence. I already provided evidence from two of the major English language news sources that completely disproves your bigoted libel of “indiscriminate” killing.

I believe that was directed at you, Brony (and of course moi). Those of us who oppose indiscriminate murder of children and other innocents are, of course, bigots. What a fucking disgusting apologist for crimes against humanity. Of course there is no evidence that any of it is *purposeful*. The hospitals, schools, UN sanctuaries, and children playing on the beach were just in the way. Killing them was just “inevitable.” I guess we are just like all of the other bigots, such as the UN Human Rights Commission, that recently voted to investigate crimes against humanity and war crimes that may be occurring right around there. By accident, of course. The nations that voted against? Just US and Israel, though most of the other cowardly West abstained.

The people accusing Israel of targeting civilians don’t seem to understand the power of the weapons used. Artillery is designed to decimate armies.

And I could care less. You don’t use military hardware in places where they may kill civilians. The sheer destruction of infrastructure and numbers of civilian casualties is obvious. Use of such weapons around civilians is de facto indiscriminate treatment of Palestinians as if they are all Hamas as far as I am concerned.